An Unexpected Tragedy
by guardian of olympus
Summary: A recent bombing raid on the 4077 M*A*S*H unit causes a lot of casualties, however, not even Hawkeye is prepared for who he finds on the operating table.


Hawkeye sat under the desk in Henry Blakes office, the hum of planes echoing overhead and the rumbles of exploding bombs shaking the ground beneath his feet.  
Beside him sat his good friend Trapper, Henry Blake and the ever faithful Radar, all waiting for the quaking to stop. Radar had sensed it before the first bomb dropped, giving them a precious few seconds to get to cover, and that had saved them some bad injurys as part of the ceiling had collapsed in almost as soon as the first bomb hit.  
"Is it over yet?" Radar yelled, his eyes clamped shut behind his glasses, clinging to the desk leg.  
"Not yet, but when it is Ill need a strong gin..." Hawkeye yelled back  
A few minutes later and the floor settled, the rumbling of the planes began to grow fainter as they flew towards the mountains. Henry immediately got up, almost hitting his head on the desk.  
"Right, Hawkeye, Trapper. Get to OR on the double, there's going to be a heck of a lot of casualties. Radar, go and help the cleanup and get any injured to OR as soon as. There's most likely more on the way so make it fast, ok?"  
"Yes sir!" Radar said, saluting, running out the door with Hawkeye and Trapper in tow.

Hawkeye managed to get inside OR just as the bombs started to fall again. The room lurched, sending him and half the staff falling to the floor, the lights flickered and the room was plunged into darkness. A few seconds later and the room settled once more.  
"Is everyone ok?" Hawkeye shouted thought the darkness. There was a reply of murmurs. He felt someone standing next to him.  
"Must have been dumping his last load." BJ said "I bet not even Radar saw that one coming."  
"Right!" Hawkeye shouted to the shifting masses of doctors "Anyone non-critical will be moved to a safer spot in camp, somewhere more stable. Anyone you can't move patch up as best you can before the next wave hits, then move them out of here!"  
"Yes doctor." Ginger said, a few other surgeons shouting their agreement above the pained groans of the patiants.  
Wounded personnel came in thick and fast, many of the less injured were moved to other buildings around the camp, but the worse injured were given to Hawkeye and his team.  
After passing on a shrapnel patiant to another team to patch up in Henry Blakes office, its hole in the ceiling patched up crudely with a corrugated iron sheet. As the next patiant was put on the table, Hawkeye looked him over. It was a sorry sight, one leg was badly littered with bomb shrapnel, his arm had been broken in three places by a falling beam and the rest of him was covered with burns and wounds, the largest of which was on his chest, barley a couple of inches from his heart. Hawkeye looked over at his medical supplies.  
"We're out of hydrocautosone. There should be some more in the store cupboard. Radar can get it in time if he runs." He paused, looking out the window. "Where is Radar?" He opened the window, shouting out into the camp "Radar!"  
Trapper tapped him on the shoulder "Hawkeye..."  
"RADAR!"  
"Hawkeye..."  
"Radar are you deaf?!"  
"Pierce!" Trapper barked. Hawkeye, spun round. Trapper never used his surname. Never. He looked at his friend with wide eyes.  
Trapper was stone face, motioning over to the operating table here the patiant lay. As Hawkeye looked longer the figure on the table became more and more familiar. Hawkeye picked up the pair of smashed glasses laying beside the unconscious kids head, looking at Trapper, utterly speechless.  
"Apparently he heard the plane coming a little to late." Trapper told him.  
Hawkeye's eyes glazed over as he dealt with the unconscious Radar, his brain on autopilot as he carefully pulled the shrapnel from his chest wound, occasionally asking for assistance from Ginger or Trapper. Frank stayed back, even he could see this was no situation for picking a fight with Hawkeye. The doctor started on Radar's chest wound, thanking whatever god there was for those inches apart his heart had been from the wound.  
He hated this war. It had killed so many and had irreparably shattered so many lives, tearing so many apart from their families, sometimes forever. He had once looked at his friends, all sitting round the dinner table, Trapper, Radar, Henry, BJ and others and thought how each one would give their life for anyone else there. Now here he was, trying to save one of them.  
"We're loosing his pulse!" Ginger shouted  
"Get him stable!" BJ told him. Hawkeye pulled his tweezers from the wound, dropping the last piece of shrapnel into the kidney dish, quickly picking up the wire and needle, stitching up the wound as fast as he could. As soon as he pulled it tight, he stepped back as the others swarmed round Radar, feeding him more gas and adrenaline.  
"He's stabilising!" BJ told them, watching the heart monitor returning to a normal rate. Everyone moved backwards as Hawkeye and Trapper came forwards to the table.  
"Right, he's stable now. I've got all the shrapnel out. Move him to the office, give him some hydrocortisone for his burns." Hawkeye told them, as they moved Radar onto the stretcher, another couple of doctors brought in the next casualties. As Radar vanished out the door, Henry came in through the other.  
"Hawkeye, go and get some rest, you've been working for twelve hours!"  
"Hm?" Hawkeye looked up. Suddenly he became aware of the time. The sun had been going down as the bombs had started falling. The first five casualties before Radar had taken at least three hours at least. Outside the sky was pitch black and according to the clock it was almost midnight.  
"How many more waiting?"  
"Five, not including minor injuries."  
"Then I'll do these five then go and sleep."  
"No. You'll go to the swamp now and sleep. You've been through to much tonight. I've already discharged Trapper from his duty." Henry told him. Hawkeye opened his mouth to retaliate, but then shut his mouth and moved away into the sterilisation room.

Hawkeye didn't sleep in the swamp that night. After a detour to help clear some rubble he made his way to Henry's office where he found Radar asleep on his stretcher, Trapper asleep on a camp bed, a spare bed and blankets beside him. Hawkeye smiled and lay on the empty camp bed, letting the tiredness catch up with him and sending him into a deep, yet restless sleep.

He was in the swamp. It was boiling hot but it wasn't the weather, over there, in the corner, the tent was on fire! It was spreading! As soon as he noticed it began to creep up the canvas until the whole place was ablaze. The flames caught the gin can and it exploded. He saw Trapper running for the door, trying the clear the debris. Frank and Margrate where yelling at them to do something. Henry was fighting through the flames, trying to get to them and in the centre of it all Radar stood, watching as the ceiling began to weaken above him, watching the steel beams began to cripple under their weight. In a few seconds it would crush him. Hawkeye yelled for him to move but then the ceiling gave way and everything went dark.

Hawkeye woke with a startled yelp, staring round the room. No fire. Trapper was there beside him, Radar on the stretcher, teddybear in his arms. Henry was fast asleep in Radars' chair, his own chair probably taken up by another sleeping casualty. Insects chirped harmlessly outside and only the occasional scuffle of feet as on duty doctors over-looked their patients.  
"Hawkeye?" A voice murmured. Hawkeye looked over to see Radar squinting at him, trying to see him without his glasses. "What happened?"  
"You got hit." Hawk said drowsily. "Thank goodness you got lucky or otherwise we wouldn't tell you apart from fried calamari." They grinned at each other "still, better than what's served in the canteen anyway..."  
Radar laughed quietly, so not to wake the others. He winced as the action caused pain to surge through him.  
"Easy, Radar. You got a nasty couple of injuries." Hawkeye stood up, going over to him.  
"My leg."  
"I'm afraid you won't be walking much this week. I got enough shrapnel out of your leg to build a whole new gun. You should be honoured for your services for metal donations to the army."  
"Thanks Hawkeye..." Radar yawned, closing his eyes once more.  
"Your welcome kid." Hawkeye said, returning to his camp bed.  
As he dozed off once more he realised how much Radar was like the younger brother he never had. Innocent, yet still up for a laugh. Maybe he could convince his old man to adopt him, he chuckled to himself.

The next morning, Radar was up and about, albeit on crutches and he wasn't allowed out of the office. During the night and most of the morning the camp had been mostly rebuilt, though there was a rain-check on when the office roof would be fixed. Hawkeye watched several of the injured limp their way across the camp. He had to admire their vigilance. Even some of the worst badly injured of the lot where hanging round outside OR incase they needed a runner for some more equipment.  
Due to their early-warning system being confined to the office, they had given Radar now had a bell to ring out of the window when he heard a helicopter coming over the mountains.

Three months had now passed and all but a few of the casualties had fully healed. Radar's injuries were now all gone, except for a few fading marks from the burns and his leg which was still needing some time to fully heal up. Hawkeye was amazed with everyone's recoveries, half of the wounds he saw he'd doubted would ever heal, but yet there they were with unmarked arms which a while ago were missing large chunks.

Thank you for reading! I may add a proper ending in a while but I can't think of one for now.

I am sorry for any medically trained readers, I am not a doctor and I am only basing the operation talk on the things I've heard from M*A*S*H, I haven't the time to take a full course in medicine for one small fan fiction so please forgive me.


End file.
